Kicking this down the road was impossible. It was do or die. The tie began. The regulations for the Burke Cup demanded that the venues were bigger each round. It was a global competition. People from all over wanted to be there to see it in person. This stadium had to be at least 50% bigger. It was the biggest stage they had been on. A whole world would be watching. The home team was exclusively alphas. A couple of them were in the top 100 in the world. That was pretty intimidating. Anna could only hope the boys could handle the pressure. Ronan was up first with the alpha ranked 86 in the world as his opponent. He fought him to the best of his ability. The chair umpire was from a neutral country, but the line judges were all of the host country. The line judges were all very quick to call Ronan's balls out and very lenient with his opponent's. Ronan had to challenge a lot of decisions. The chair empire actually called things down the middle. Once the plays were reviewed, Ronan had the bad calls overturned 89% of the time. People booed. They were pissed off.
Uppity omegas should know their place. How dare Ronan argue with an alpha official? It was because the line judges were trying to screw him over. At the end Ronan, in his usual dominant fashion, won the rubber in 3 sets. All the natives were screaming in outrage. It took 10 minutes to quiet the crowd. The chair umpire threatened them with disqualifying the team. It made everyone shut up. The rookie alpha pulled through in the fifth set for a win. The boys clutched both the doubles rubbers for the overall win in the tie. That did not go over well. Everyone was on the verge of rioting. It was time to go. The security team, Simon and Owen had to extract everyone fast. It was never in the plan for them to stay long in the country. They went straight to the airport. Not even the terminal was safe, so they had to board from the tarmac. Everyone hated them and the air marshal could not ensure the safety of the delegation from Breaca. Even with all the fuss, the trip was a giant success. They would be going to the finals. One more tie to go, and they would have their Burke Cup.
